Olympic Team medalist and coach Mirai Nagasu offers feedback to an axel class at a camp, and World and Olympic coach Rafael Arutyunyun discusses the importance of the method and timing of loading/exploding on the axel. Mirai is working with just a portion of the overall group of skaters on the ice, and the overall session is being led by Rafael. We join the class with Mirai sharing feedback about single axel attempts based on the drills and teachings of Rafael. From these interactions we can guess at some of the points that Rafael made earlier in the presentation.
The skaters are using a two-foot push back to a relatively strong back outside edge where they focus on alignment (leaning back into the circle) and shoulder and arm position (arms outside the circle with the non-axis arm “across the mid-line”). Notice the free foot held back in inside the preparation edge circle. The skater then steps forward by pressing the take-off hip forward with the skating side shoulder, knee, and hip in alignment. The arms should come through in the direction of the jump (to the axis side since the body is beginning to turn during the take-off).
Rafael then explains that he prefers skaters to be up out of the knees prior to the step forward. This ensures proper take-off leg/knee/ankle loading which can then be used immediately to jump. There is no long squatty back preparation edge, and the forward take-off edge consists of loading and then unloading/exploding without a pause or wait. Rafael refers to this naturally springy behavior of the muscles as “tension.” So the rhythm has the skater coming up at the end of the preparation edge, then down for the step and right back up for the jump.
After this Mirai returns to offering feedback to individuals in her breakout group. She talks about keeping the hips closed (for a skater whose “knees are quite open”), fixing the knee action as described by Rafael (“you have to rise up before you step down”), and starting position for this drill (axis foot in front to maximize edge pressure from the non-axis skate onto axis skate preparation edge).
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